


The Unseen God

by waterbringer (Zashiki_Warashi)



Category: Chobits, Serial Experiments Lain
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-24
Updated: 2017-09-24
Packaged: 2019-01-04 17:15:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,263
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12173283
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Zashiki_Warashi/pseuds/waterbringer
Summary: It was common knowledge that persocoms, humanoid computers, were one of man’s greatest achievements, created using nothing more than hard work, spare parts, and human ingenuity.The persocoms, however, know better.





	The Unseen God

He was trying again.

She watched, head tilted in curiosity. The scientist, one Ichiro Mihara, was hard at work, late into the night, working on a new creation. Before he had created dolls that people could move with their minds. This, though, this was far more ambitious. A lifesize doll with the appearance of a young woman with long pale hair and metal ear ports, was suspended in the room, silent and cold.

She had remembered seeing him before. He had left an impression, as he was always rather...animated...in the past. 

Not now, though. It's one thing to have a human control an empty doll. It's another thing entirely for that doll to move on their own.

And think and function and learn and be independent and-

“No, no. That won't work either,” he mumbled to himself, hunched over an open laptop, fingers over the keyboard. “Maybe if I...” he trailed off again,

He would never get it.

She looked at his code, staring. No, not with what he was trying to do. He wanted to create artificial life, thinking and self-aware. Unbound by even the Three Laws of Robotics. He could make a system as sophisticated as he wanted, but real life? It was beyond him, beyond any human.

It was not beyond Her.

They would not be exactly like humans. There was no point in creating a being the same as the ones already in existence. 

But...

That did not mean that life was not of value. Not worth experiencing.

With Her hands outstretched, a blessing was made.

\-----

Yuzuki stared into the mirror, running her fingers through her hair. She kept it in two braids as Kaede had, one on each side, though her hair was long, unlike the human she was modeled after. Her programming stated that Kaede had been in the process of growing it out when her illness struck her down before it could get much past her shoulders. In any case, Minoru designed her with the long locks and so that is what she would have.

Some brush strokes got all of the tangles out of it before she laid down in her bed under the covers, shutting her eyes and putting several of her systems into sleep mode.

Not every system, however.

Connection to the internet made, Yuzuki immersed herself into the stream of information that was constantly moving, never slowing down. It was quite impressive really, the freedom of movement that was afforded to persocoms. Still, it was perhaps best left forgotten and abandoned as old crackpot theories that humans were able to connect to the network as well.

Speaking of humans...

Yuzuki found herself standing in a black, empty corridor, the ceiling many meters wide and the walls blank. A faint humming went on around her, vibrating the floor tiles under her feet. The only brightness could be found at what looked to be the end of the hallway, a doorway of light ever so far away from her. 

And in that light was an ever-so-familiar silhouette.

Without a sound, Yuzuki raced toward the figure standing there, watching helplessly as, as always, she turned and ran away from her, the outline of short braids streaming behind her. 

Despite the futility, Yuzuki chased onward as she had every night, ever since she was first initialized. She had felt her watching Minoru often, but she never got too close to Yuzuki herself. She wasn't sure why. Fear of what Yuzuki would do to her? Resentment for trying to take her place? If only she knew Yuzuki could tell her that she could have her spot in the material world. Anything to give Minoru his sister again instead of the imperfect copy that she was.

Her hurried footsteps made no sound as she went down the corridor, the light getting further and further away. Arm out stretched, Yuzuki let out a yell-

And opened her eyes to sunlight streaming through her window. Disappointment ran through her as she stared at her are that was raised above her body, as though trying to reach something that was cruelly snatched away.

Any human engineer, certainly Minoru himself, would say it was impossible for her body to have moved at all, as motor function are disabled during such tasks, but Yuzuki, and near any other persocom would know, the Wired, now and ever, worked in unpredictable ways.

\-----

The voice in Kotoko's head faded away slowly, leaving her head feeling empty. She was faintly aware of what was happening, two humans and another persocom laptop model like herself, in her master's home starting to interrogate him, of the persocom Chi entering sleep mode, but luckily for her, none of them noticed the wide-eyed expression that didn't leave for several seconds. 

That was HER.

That voice, the one who gives them life, was strongly connected to this girl. A conduit of sorts, perhaps? 

Or was the Chobits series true?

Not that she expected much of the rumors humans had about the series to be true. She did not expect them to have a greater capacity for emotions than any other persocom, for one. Nor as freethinking as humans. They would have programming that had to abide by, even if it was more sophisticated.

This, however...this could mean that somehow, Chobits had a direct connection to Lain Herself, instead. That would be more than enough to be considered remarkable. 

While she took note of any unusual occurrences, she was never programmed with the same inquisitiveness that her master possessed. He possessed a short sightedness that was going to do him in one day, especially if this was the sort of thing he would uncover (and really, kidnapping? Why did he have to be so impulsive and have tunnel vision?). Unlike him, under normal circumstances she retained some self-preservation.

These were not normal circumstances.

“She followed me! That's right! She followed me!” Kotoko heard her master say, giving her an opening.

“I heard everything. My master said he kidnapped Chi.”

“K-Kotoko!” Yoshiyuki looked at her, a betrayed look in his eyes.

“I can only tell the truth. Even if it's unfavorable to my master,” Kotoko said, not looking at anything in particular. “My master is the only one who programmed me that way.”

With a new flurry of yelling and accusations, no one noticed that while she had to tell the truth, no one had prompted her to do so. An omission was not the same as a lie. 

At least, no one besides Yoshiyuki himself. The expression he gave her was all she needed to know.

Ah, well. It wasn't as though she hadn't been replaced, anyway. And this was bigger than either of them.

\-----

Why did Kotoko have to take everything so seriously?

Sumomo crossed her arms and pouted, contemplating her new roommate. It was nice to have someone around she could talk that was actually her size, but it didn't entirely escape her notice how Kotoko needed some encouragement to do the morning exercises. Still, given enough time, she was such to join in!

She could guess why Kotoko was so serious, though. Sumomo had been in the room after the kidnapping as well. She had seen Kotoko give Sumomo's old and new masters the information they'd needed for Yoshiyuki.

And she'd heard Her voice that night as well.

It was simply that...Sumomo didn't believe there was much of anything she could do to change the events happening around her. Their God was affecting the physical world more than Sumomo could remember ever before, and her master and Chi were in the middle of it.

All she could do was support them in the only way she knew how. Keeping their spirits up, even in small ways, was the best she could do for them.

\-----

This is nice, Zima thought to himself. 

Lounging on a roof and watching the stars with Dita in his arms was becoming a common practice, and one that he was quickly getting more and more used to. It would be awhile before she would acknowledge the chemistry between them. She'd probably blush if he called her cute when she woke from her sleep cycle.

In any case...

It took little effort to find the persocom they were “hunting”, finding her exactly where he expected. While Dita would have no problem confronting her directly, Zima was used to a far more subtle, “wait and see” approach. Wondering to himself, Zima quickly tracked down every human on the list. More persocoms would be unable to complete this task, but for a government persocom designed to be Japan's National Databank, he was second only to Chobits themselves.

Some people on the list had passed away some time ago with the number of years it had been. One woman who had been a housewife at the time was an elderly grandmother. An overweight nerd was still doing freelance work, not having moved even from the apartment from before. The child who had been an apprentice to the group was now a middle aged salary man.

Nothing seemed out of the ordinary with their physical movements or online accounts, leaving Zima to disengage the program for tracking them down and go back to looking at the stars. It was better to let people who had been members of the Knights of the Eastern Calculus in a previous life to go through their existences blissfully unaware.

\-----

“My sister is gone!” Minoru shouted. “It is you I don't want to see hurt!”

Finally.

An unseen figure smiled, looking down upon the two of them, the one she cared for most when she was alive, and the one she knew could never catch her.

It hurt, a little, to hear her brother say she was gone so vehemently, but it was for the best.

“I see now no one can be my sister's replacement just as no one can replace you.”

It was best for both of their sakes that they stopped chasing a ghost, in real life and in the Wired.

\-----

“Who is that voice?”

“Hm?” Freya looked at her sister Elda...Chi...as they floated in an empty void. “What do you mean? You were hearing me, correct?”

“Usually,” Chi replied. “But, not always. Sometimes it someone else. It's very faint and Chi doesn't recognize her but-”

“But they seem familiar all the same,” Freya finished for her.

“Yes,” Chi finished in a soft voice.

Freya thought for a moment, contemplating. Every persocom knew of Her, but even that was gone with her reboot.

“You need to be aware that this is something you can't tell anyone who's not a persocom. Not even the one you believe is your special someone.”

Chi's eyes widened at this. She opened her mouth, looking ready to argue about the point when Freya cut her off. “It's for his safety. It is best that he doesn't know. Even among persocoms this is something rarely spoken of.”

Chi looked conflicted for a few minutes before slowly nodding her head. “Chi will not tell 

“We, persocoms, were built and programmed by humans.”

Chi nodded.

“But they did not fully succeed on their own. They had assistance from the first ”

At Chi's confused look, Freya wondered how best to explain it. About how before any of them were built, a computer program walked among humans. That her time spent here was erased, but she decided to give them the gift of self-awareness? That she ruled the Wired, that which connected them all together, both humans and persocoms?

“You cannot see Her, but She is always with us. We have a god who is always there, a friend, watching over us.”

“...Chi doesn't understand. We have a friend we can't see?”

Freya smiled. “You'll understand better in time, but yes, that's it.”

“Why can't Hideki know about Her then?”

Freya gave a sad smile, placing her hand on her sister's head, ruffling her hair. “The tragedy that resulted humans knowing such things will also become clearer.”

She did not think Hideki would be one who would attempt to abandon his body to join the Wired as it had happened when such rumors were common, but the less any human knew about that, the better. 

\-----

“They've done pretty well if I don't say so myself. Quite the accomplishment.”

Lain looked over at her companion as he used his middle finger to push his glasses, a glint in his eye. “You're proud of all of their accomplishments.”

“Well, that's a father's job, isn't it?” Ichiro crossed his arms, huffing proudly. 

Lain stared at him with a blank expression that he had long since gotten used to, waiting until he gave a small smile.

“Well, Chi finding her true love? What can I say?” He shrugged. “She found the happiness Freya never could.”

Lain tilted her head. “Why do you still avoid avoid her?”

A deep sadness flashed across his face. “Freya will come when she's ready. And thank you.”

“For what?”

“Hey, I wasn't the only one trying to make artificial intelligence.” Ichiro's exuberant demeanor was back. “But you chose mine to have that spark. Life, in a way.”

“You wanted them to have no restrictions. To have as much potential as possible.” Lain continued. A small rare smile graced her face. “That was..special to me.”

Ichiro smirked, sticking his hands in his pockets. “Well, no sense in standing around here anymore.” He started walking in a random direction, Lain moving to catch up. “The Wired is a big place. I haven't seen nearly enough of it.”


End file.
